Google Analytics is a free, enterprise-level analytics service that allows you to track your website visits and pageviews. Google Analytics offers much more comprehensive tracking and deeper insights compared to the WordPress Stats package that comes with the Jetpack plugin, but there is 1 main drawback – you have to login to the Google Analytics website to view your stats.

Google Analytics Dashboard widget

The Google Analytics Dashboard plugin fills the gap by displaying the most important stats in your WordPress dashboard. This article explains how you can install the plugin and connect it to your Google Analytics account.

Note: The Google Analytics Dashboard plugin does provide the tracking code for Google Analytics. For that you will need to use a plugin like Google Analytics for WordPress.

Install the Plugin

Install the Google Analytics Dashboard plugin

Login to your WordPress dashboard and navigate to Plugins → Add New. Type ‘Google Analytics Dashboard’ into the search field and click the Search Plugins button. Click Install Now for the Google Analytics Dashboard plugin by Carson McDonald.

WordPress will now download the plugin and install it on your site. Click Activate to enable the plugin.

Authenticate Your Website With Google

This step connects your WordPress site to Google Analytics. Click the button to proceed.

You will be brought to a login page on Google.com. Once logged in, you’ll be asked to grant access to Google Analytics.

Grant access for your website

Make sure that you are logged in to the correct Google Account for your Analytics and then click the Grant access button.

You will return to the settings page for the Google Analytics Dashboard plugin.

Configure Plugin Settings

Configure plugin settings

Configure the plugin settings by selecting the correct analytics account and profile. By default the dashboard widget is only shown to Administrators, but you can change this by selecting the appropriate role from the Dashboard Level drop down. You can also label your analytics Goals, but this is an optional step.

Finally you can choose to disable post status display if the plugin is slowing down the loading time of your post listing screens.

Plugin Tips

You can reposition the dashboard widget by dragging and dropping it to the desired location on screen.

The plugin also displays analytics graphs on your post listings. If your post listings screens are getting too crowded you can hide the graphs or other columns from the Screen Options tab at the top right of the page.